A Very Pensive Christmas Eve

It's a quiet Christmas in the Velasquez home.

The parties we attended to were less than 10, we are far from our extended family so there were no scheduled visits and reunions.

For a busy person like me it is a big relief. Being able to spend time blogging and leave the men to the cooking is already a treat for me. 2 days of respite is enough to fuel me for the homestretch this year.

I've been resisting the temptation to work. Instead, I'd like to reflect on the past year and in order to do that I have to go as far back as 2017.

2017 was a turbulent year for us. My husband and I went through so many challenges in the family, careers, and health. The theme for that year was BROKE... no that's not a grammatical error.

G resigned from his job that year. We had everything planned out. What we haven't foreseen were the gravity of the issues that we were going to face. Due to many bad decisions our savings dwindled, I accepted a fulltime job that I wasn't happy in, we were paying amortizations for our second home, we were financially broke and as cherry on top I broke my arm that had me immobilized for 4 months.

That made us look optimistically ahead to 2018. We have sunk so low that there was nowhere to go but up.

2018 was a rollercoaster. We thought we were already winning in the first 6 months of the year. But bad decisions happened again so we sunk a bit lower. Tension was high in the family. Just when we thought that we were doing better, another surgery looms ahead. Not me this time but our eldest son Seth.

I'd like to feel sorry for my family, but that's not gonna help. Instead of focusing on the negative situations, I should count our blessings. There were opportunities that came around that would become vehicles to improving our situation.

WHAT I'M THANKFUL FOR IN 2018

1. I recovered the full range of motion of my broken arm. As a bonus I learned calligraphy and conducted my first workshop on Basic Brush Calligraphy to a mixed group of teens and adults.
2. Despite the challenge in our real estate profession, we had several sales that helped improve our financial standing.  There are times that I would be embarrassed that I wasn't hitting millions just like my fellow brokers. But looking back those sales were already good enough considering that I was inactive for about a few months. 
3. An opportunity to go back to my profession in media was offered. It came as a surprise when an IT company approached me to become the Managing Director of the Mindanao Travel Channel.  
4. My hubby started his career in Systems Consulting, Packaging Design and Real Estate Appraisal. This is his expertise and I am so happy that he has finally found his niche. 
5. My eldest son turned 18. It is a big relief to finally have a 3rd adult that we can share the load in the family. I have also noticed that when we started to call him an adult he became responsible and developed the natural leader in him.
6. ES (eldest son) had his first job with Big Bad Wolf - Davao. This helped him appreciate the value of work and stewardship. He learned to go to work as early as 6am. I was a proud momma when I saw him working hard and didn't call in sick despite having a flu and mouth sores. This developed the grit and determination in him.
7. Our younger son improved in reading and was assessed to have advanced Abstract Reasoning skills. YS became a more sensitive and considerate child. He continues to develop his skills in the field of the arts, sports, and because he would come with me to my shoots, he has developed an interest in photography, directing, and animation.
8. I had the opportunity to restart my branding, design, and real estate businesses. I'm thankful that there are people who believed in what I can do and encouraged me to keep improving and moving forward. 

I have many more reasons to be thankful but the 8 above are the ones that are very significant. And everytime I would start thinking about how unfortunate things had been the past 2 years, I have reasons to be grateful.

🥂As you celebrate Christmas, I pray that each family would have the spirit of gratitude and would take time to reflect on the blessings that they have received this year. Cheers!